ALL travail of high thought,
All secrets vainly sought,
All struggles for right, heroic, perpetually fought.
Faint gleams of purer fire,

Conquests of gross desire,
Whereby the fettered soul ascends continually higher.
Pure cares for love or friend
Which ever upward tend,

Too deep and heavenward and true to have on earth their end.
Vile hearts malign and fell,
Lives which no tongue may tell,
So dark and dread and shameful that they breathe a present hell.

White mountain, deep-set lake,
Sea wastes which surge and break,
Fierce storms which, roaring from the north, the midnight forests shake.
Fair morns of summer days,

Rich harvest eves that raise
The soul and heart o'erburdened to an ecstasy of praise.
Low whispers, vague and strange,
Which through our being range,

Breathing perpetual presage of some mighty coming change.
These in the soul do breed
Thoughts which, at last, shall lead
To some clear, firm assurance of a satis fying creed.